Gamlingay Wood Carpetted with Fungi

Gamlingay Woods are so full of fungi at the moment that it is difficult to know which ones to choose to photograph. Here a selection taken with a tilt and shift lens.

Cambridge - Autumn on Hold

There is not much in the way of autumn colours in Cambridge yet - the Plane trees and ornamental trees in the Sidgewick site have turned golden but most other species are only showing patches of turned leaves (except the Horse Chestnuts, which have been badly affected by leaf-mining beetles again this year).

Santon Downham 2 - Playing with Light and Focus Stacking

As well as photographing the different types of fungi in Thetford Forest on Sunday, I also spent time doing different light set ups with a continuous LED light source sometimes with a magenta filter. The first image is of the Pine Cone Ttoadstool - around 3mm maximum cap size growing out of cones with the light behind to illuminate the cap. I tried to get backlit spore release from the Puff Balls but this definitely needs more experimentation. The last two images are focus stacks of the Sulphur Tuft toadstool. The first is a stack of 51 images and shows too much depth of field. I suspected this at the time by looking at the last image in the series so took a second stack of 31 images which brings most of the clump into focus but still separates from background (Fuji bracket handheld, Zerene stacker). 

Fungi Foray at Santon Downham 1

A party of 10 CCC and RPS Members enjoyed a day in Thetford Forest scrabbling among the leaf litter and fallen branches for fungi. It is a superb year for them with the wet and warm conditions. Here some 'straight' shots of a few types that we found including a stand of Fly Agarics which took some finding - we were sure they must be moving as each set of directions we received from walkers were different!

Cambridge Wanders versus Rosslyn Park 2nds

Cambridge Rugby union FC's 2nd team were heavily defeated by Rosslyn Park while the CRUFC first team unexpectedly won. Here a few images from the 2nd team match - the light was very good though gave some problems with the greens which varied greatly in hue depending whether the sun was out or behind clouds.